According to Ryan, Hankin, Kent, Inc. (RHK), the San Francisco-based market research and consulting firm, Internet traffic will have reached 350,000 Terabytes per month as we pass into the new millennium. This is a significant milestone, as it indicates that data has already surpassed the voice network. To keep pace with seemingly insatiable demand for higher-speed access, a huge, complex, network-building process is beginning. Decisions made by network architects today will have an immense impact on the future profitability, flexibility, and competitiveness of network operators. Despite the dominance of synchronous optical network (SONET), a transport technology based on time division multiplexing (TDM), more and more operators consider adopting a point-to-point strategy and eventual mesh topology. This article highlights the key advantages of this new approach.

With such strong demand for wideband access—1.5 million households already have cable or digital subscriber line (DSL) modems capable of operating at 1 Mbps—there is no doubt that the future for service providers is extremely bright. However, there are a number of more immediate challenges that must be addressed. At the top of the list is the fact that network investments must be made before revenues are realized. As a result, there is a need for less complex and more efficient network builds. In an effort to cut network costs, action is being taken across several fronts: consolidating network elements, boosting reliability, reducing component system costs, and slashing operational costs. As far as optical networks are concerned, the action likely to make the most positive impact is the deployment of new network architectures, such as point-to-point/mesh designs. Ring architectures will still be supported, but new Internet protocol (IP) and asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) networks will find that mesh, with its well-defined optical nodes, lends itself to robust optical rerouting schemes (see Figure 1).

Figure 1. Ring, Point-to-Point, and Mesh Topologies